BY MIKE PRATER
@KTIK.COM
The Boise State football team has a problem, a public relations problem, and there are a lot of people who seem hell-bent on fixing the issue.
The problem: The Broncos don’t have a rival, which is a major component to the GREAT game of college football. College football teams and their fan bases need an evil counterpart, an opponent that inspires emotions, a team to crush in victory and one to despise in defeat.
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Boise State used to have a rival, but that relationship died Nov. 12, 2010, the last time the Broncos played the Idaho Vandals. The rivalry was born in 1971 when the Broncos beat the Vandals in Moscow. A year later, Idaho beat Boise State in Bronco Stadium and the rivalry was on.
Boise State and Idaho eventually played 40 games, with the Broncos winning 22 times, but the series no longer exists with the two programs heading in opposite directions.
Now who do you hate, Boise State?
Fans and media tried to build a rivalry with BYU, but that series didn’t start until 2003 and the teams have played only eight times. Definitely not a rivalry.
The hot candidate … again … is the Nevada Wolf Pack, a struggling 1-7 team that plays Boise State on Saturday in Albertsons Stadium.
This one makes sense, but not really. The Boise State-Nevada series started exactly two weeks after that first Idaho game in 1971. Boise State and Nevada have played 40 times since, making it the most-played series in the history of Bronco football.
It’s a series that spans five decades and four conferences, and Boise State fans have enjoyed the ride, driving en masse to Reno every other year for a weekend of college football debauchery.
But here’s the problem:
No. 1, Nevada’s rival is Nevada-Las Vegas.
No. 2, Boise State and Nevada don’t even play every year because of a rotating schedule in the Mountain West Conference.
Mostly, Boise State and Nevada aren’t rivals because the series is lopsided. Boise State has won 14 of the past 15 games by an average of 24 points. Over the course of the series, Nevada has won twice in Boise, but not once in 20 years.
Bottom line: Fans can hope, and the media can keep asking questions, but you can’t force a rivalry. It has to happen organically, with shared successes, fan emotions, regionalism, pageantry and history.
Boise State has a proud and successful football program, with a lot of bling, but it definitely doesn’t have a rival … and that won’t change Saturday or anytime in the near future.
Mike Prater, editor of The Opinionator, co-hosts Idaho Sports Talk with Caves & Prater weekdays from 3-6 p.m. on KTIK 93.1 FM The Ticket and can be heard on Bronco GameNights after BSU football games on KBOI 670 AM and KTIK 93.1 FM. He can be reached at [email protected], and found @CavesandPrater(Facebook) and @MikeFPrater (Twitter).
